The reader should also remember that James uses these ideas with a great deal of flexibility

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Unformatted text preview: The reader should also remember that James uses these ideas with a great deal of flexibility. It does not always hold that every European will have exactly these qualities or that every American will. Indeed, some of the more admirable characters are Europeans who possess many of these qualities and in turn lack others. Because a European might possess urbanity and knowledge and experience does not necessarily mean that he is artificial and evil. And quite the contrary, many Americans come with natural spontaneity and are not necessarily honest and admirable. In Daisy Miller, James is more concerned with the difference in behavior than he is with the specific person. But generally, the character that represents the American is, of course, Daisy Miller herself. The representative of the European attitude in the worst sense of the word is Mrs. Costello, and to a The representative of the European attitude in the worst sense of the word is Mrs....
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